Category Archives: Club News

Despite the continuing wintery snap, there were a total of eighteen members out on the course today to tackle our favourite competition – Par.  There wasn’t as much frost on the ground as last week but the conditions felt just as chilly and there was the usual discussion about those hardy souls turning out in shorts and the associated condition with no feeling as well as some about certain parts of the anatomy turning blue.

Now, nobody was running particularly hot, but Allan was able to claim a bit of warmth when he managed to come in front of the pack of hounds with a +1 on the card.  In actual fact, there was not a pack of hounds in sight so it is unclear what the fox, spotted running across the 6th and 3rd fairways, was high-tailing it from.  Old rocker, Allan, immediately brought to mind the song, Fox on the run, and struggled to keep it out of his brain for the rest of the round.   Maybe it was the beat that kept his swing in synch and his putting stroke smooth.

Damo came in second with a square card and even if he had sunk the 1.5m eagle putt on the 17th, he wouldn’t have equalled the top score as the birdie was enough to give him a plus and added one to the tally of seven that we managed for the day.  A marginally better strike rate for birdies than in recent weeks.  Damo did admit to being distracted by what he thought was an escapee from a nearby retirement home but in actual fact it was merely Allan tootling around on Thunderbird II.

Gordon, Rob and the Beast came in in third place with one less point than second.  All three would be ruing the occasional (and not so occasional) negative results on the card.  There was no particular cause or failure of note to report and the round was generally described as ‘boring as bat-droppings’ or some similar analogy.  Michael put in a very steady round with not too many non-square results on the card and scored himself 4th place with a score of -2.  Bringing up the rear, in a place-getters sense, were Ryan and JohnQ, just another point behind with -3.  Jason dipped out of the winners circle by dint of claiming an extra stroke on the 13th from an 18 handicap.  Not hard to do if you are used to getting 2 there.

The BallPin today was on the 12th, which was a bit of a challenge with the tee blocks set well to the back.  Allan bought himself a new seven wood at the op-shop for $5.00 and tried it out for the first time on the 12th and, not only did he hit the ball well, he got his name on the BallPin card as well.  However, Michael came along and put one closer and shut Allan out of getting a fair bit of his investment back.  The first ProPin was set for the 4th.  The tee blocks were as far back as they could go and the pin was at the back edge of the green but whether this is a valid reason why nobody managed to put one onto the green within the required distance is very much open to question.  So, it will be on the 4th again next week as a Jackpot.  The second ProPin, on the 18th, on the other hand, had the tee at the front and the pin on the bottom deck.  Brendon put his on, but when the tape came out, it was just beyond the 5m limit.  No such problem for Noodles who put his to 1.81m and collected a few dollars for his TAB account.

There was a Matchplay match played today between Pepsi and Michael and with them both on a handicap of 3 it was very much a head to head battle.  Michael won the first hole and, try as he might, Pepsi was never able to peg him back to any significant degree and the match eventually went Michael’s way 3 and 2.  Michael wasn’t particularly happy with the way he played but Pepsi reckoned he couldn’t putt for love nor money.  Reckons he must have caught Chrispy’s disease down at Bellarine the week before last.  Or maybe it was still a hang-over from last week-end’s celebrations.  The Chrispy thing does have a bit of a ring of truth about it though as it seems that Chris took five (yes 5) putts on one green, including three that lipped out for less than half a metre.

Noodles had a new, short grip, putter today courtesy of Michael.  Not sure how the putter actually went but Noodles, playing in a three behind a four, seemed to be blaming standing around waiting for some of his less spectacular outcomes.  Brendon had a few problems with trees and things today and in one particularly bad sequence managed to put together four of the horizontals in a row.  This brought the suggestion from Gordo, that this should provide grounds for making a shout for your group.  As it turned out, Brendon would not have been alone in that cart as Chrispy and Blighty achieved a similar (or even greater) feat.  Blighty didn’t hang around to comment as he wanted to be off for another afternoon of misery at a Collingwood match.

Next week is the first round of the Fred Howe Winter Cup.  A good chance to get some double points to catch up to Bob.  Plus, it ushers in three (yes, 3) weeks of Stableford so get out there and take advantage of it while you can.  Also, just over a month to the Annual Challenge up at Shepparton.  Gordo should be issuing more details shortly although he could be a little distracted for the next couple of weeks as he heads off to Wauchope for (as the say on Radio Melbourne) a well deserved break.

Results for Saturday, 08 July 2017
1st Allan Davies(+1) 2nd Damien Lee(□) 3rd Bill Eastoe(-1) 3rd Gordon Hill(-1) 3rd Robert Priems(-1) 4th Michael Gourlay(-2) 5th Ryan Porker(-3) 5th John Quinlan(-3)

Seniors Results: 1st Allan Davies (+1) 2nd Bill Eastoe (-1) 2nd Gordon Hill (-1) 3rd Keith Delzoppo (-4)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin No 1 4th Jackpot ProPin No 2 18th Stephen Butterfield BallPin 12th Michael Gourlay

A couple of weeks ago, the Club was delighted to spot a number of the extremely rare cah-cah birds shuffling around the first tee as we waited to hit off.  Well today it was the even rarer oohma bird.  For those not into ornithology, this is another bird that lives in the Antarctic but it has absolutely no legs.  And every time it comes to land on the ice it can be heard giving out its characteristic cry – oohma doodle, oohma doodle.

An example of one such bird was captured out on the course being chatted up by one of our hardy band of of shorts wearing members though there was some discussion as to whether it really was an oohma, the characteristic call not having been heard, or whether its tiny feet were just frozen to the ground.  Keith was not responsible for the apparent dazed condition of the bird.  Needless to say, it was pretty icy out there and quite a few topped shots were blamed on the fact that players were carrying an extra inch of ice on the soles of their shoes.  The area around the pin on the second was giving a very good impression of the surface of the moon with the multitude of craters from iced up sprigs.

There was also a bit of fog about for a while but not one of our twenty-one players managed to get lost although there were a couple of early withdrawals.  Steve reckoned he was coming down with something but managed to make it to the 9th before pulling the pin and heading for somewhere warmer.  Dave, on the other hand looked as if he was going to come up with something and his playing companions assessed him as being a ‘lighter shade of pale’ before he too headed off to put his head down.  Just what he was going to put it down was not specified.  Something he drank the night before was a likely cause.  So, with two down there were only nineteen left to finish off the round to decide the July Medal.  At this point, the Birthday Birdie would like to mention that this week sees a significant milestone for Pepsi on the anniversary front and today’s celebrations are just a few days early of the mark.  Happy Birthday Pepsi.  But, just imagine how many players we would have had were it not for the big bash today.

Dennis wasn’t one hundred percent happy with his game despite being assured that he wasn’t going too badly and was in with a chance.  As the back nine progressed, his swing found its groove and the club really started to make contact with the ball.  So much so, that on the 15th, the ball almost ended in the car-park so it was somewhat off line.  Targe reported its position but it turned to be too hard to find.  On the 17th, the drive was right in the Lord Mayor’s Office and the chip was right on line but pulled up just a bit short.  The birdie was a welcome result. It contributed to another paltry total of five for the field and won the event with a nett card of 69.

A par there would have resulted in a three way tie with the Beast and Dale who both had their moments with quadruple bogies on their cards.  As it turned out, Dennis would still have won on a count-back.  Bill could easily have been much further down the field as he hit three balls from the tee on the 14th.  Fortunately for Bill, he found the first and proceeded to get his par for the hole.  Michael was heard to be less than happy with at least one of his tee shots but in true Michael style he was still able to put together a pretty good round and came in 3rd spot with his nett 71 from a 74 off the stick.  He was joined by Brendon who was spotted almost lying prone in the middle of the 16th trying to get a sight on the pin of the 14th with his laser range-finder.  Gordon also shared this podium spot after thrilling the crowd with a monster putt for birdie on the 1st, only to let them down when he missed a tiddler on the 18th.  Gordon is a bit of a numbers man and he was all excited about the significance of today’s date and the fact that if you wrote it a certain way it read the same backwards and forwards, which could go some way to explaining the hash he made of writing the date on the top of the results sheet.

Targe (popularly known as Yours Truly) scored himself the 4th place spot on his own with a very steady 72 nett.  Craig reckons he could have played better if it hadn’t taken at least six holes to start thawing out and to stop wearing elevator shoes.  Bob started out a bit on the average side but his game did pick up and he opined that he had not had a whinge all day.  A contra view was that he was actually crying.  Still, a point is a point, and Bob is still the man to catch.  When Bob handed his card in, Targe and others did a double-take as the score written in the result block showed nett 23.  Noodles swears that it was a seven but the only explanation can be that he had a severe case of the hiccups at the time that he wrote it.

After a serious run of Jackpots on the Nearest the Pin competitions over the last month, everyone was on tenterhooks as to whether the run would continue today.  But, it was not to be though there were a few groups through before a name was penned.  The BallPin was on the 15th and Gordo got it not all that close but obviously close enough.  Harry’s was exactly pin high and probably closer but it was his second shot after a stray went OOB.  The ProPin on the 12th only just went off with Simon putting his to 4.52m which was, according to Simon, the highlight of his day.  Only seventeen more to go Si!  The ProPin on the 18th was another one that Harry was exactly pin high to, just not on the green.  That job was left up to Porks who collected the dosh with 2.29m.

And, while on the topic of Noodles, he achieved something today that few others in the club have and had a par on the 2nd from the back blocks.  His drive wasn’t all that great, his second was OK, but the third was a bottler and put the ball almost to gimme distance.  Just goes to show that you chip and putt for dough.  And still on the subject of Noodles and his putting it seems that he is experimenting with different styles to try to improve his performance (putting, that is).  He has worked through conventional, baseball, claw, Wie claw and so forth.  The most successful might have him buying one of the cut-down kids putters though he thinks he might not be able to stand after playing a round putting bent double.

Ed and Michael played in the same group today and marked each other’s cards.  Now Michael has been known to leave it for a hole or two before ‘catching up’ and it seems that Ed’s short term memory went out the window with his teeth.  As a result there was quite a bit of discussion between them about scores and the card marked by Ed was messier than normal.  On the 8th, Michael estimated that Ed’s approach shot was probably on a fairway over at Greenacres but Ed insisted on searching for it while the rest of the group putted out.  By the time that they persuaded Ed out of the jungle and he finished off his 8 strokes for the hole they were about two holes behind and never really caught up.

There was only one draughtie reported today and that was down to Trevor once again.  Not sure which hole it was on but today was not one of Trev’s best.  But, hang in there Trev, one in twenty is a good one (just ask Simon).  Allan has formed a view that deafness can cause heart attacks.  It’s not that he has gone deaf or anything though his dog has and he reckons it just about has a heart attack if you surprise it when it is not looking.

Winter Cup coming up the week after next so this is a big chance for someone to catch Bob (unless, of course, he wins it).  And, yes, it is Par next week but that is no excuse not to come along.  After that, you can revel in three weeks of Stableford.

Results for Saturday, 01 July 2017
1st Dennis Ward(69) 2nd Bill Eastoe(70) 2nd Dale Webb(70) 3rd Michael Gourlay(71) 3rd Gordon Hill(71) 3rd Brendon Mitchell(71) 4th Targe Mifsud(72) 5th Craig Cameron(73) 5th Bob McDonald(73)

Seniors Results: 1st Dennis Ward (69) 2nd Bill Eastoe (70) 3rd Gordon Hill (71)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin No 1 12th Simon Powell ProPin No 2 18th Ryan Porker BallPin 15th Gordon Hill

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Last week’s trip to the Bellarine apparently had its moments.  Particularly the moments when Chrispy worked out how to email a photo, and again, and again, and again…..Only a few were hardy enough to get themselves to the course again today but, despite that, there was a roll up of seventeen (and Ed who was on a promise and wouldn’t play unless he could be guaranteed to be home by 1200).  As it turned out the game went pretty quickly and Ed could just about have made it.  Blighty was also keen to get away.  Something to do with an important meeting at Jolimont.  The starters generously sent his team out first despite it being a group of four.  And they cracked right along and set a good pace that the groups of three had to work to keep up with.

The speed of play could easily have had something to do with the seven birdies that the team managed to score, with six of them on the back nine.  Whitey was speculating, during the round, about how many under par would be required to win and his favoured number was at least five or six.  So he wasn’t too far off the pace and the team came in with 63 off the stick for  54 nett.  The DRAG team (Dennis, Rob, Andrew and Gordon) played like a well oiled machine with Blighty leading the charge by driving like a demon while the others kept the ball rolling (figuratively speaking) with the chipping and putting.  Their round wasn’t without its moments though.  Rob’s drive on the 4th went well left and low heading into the trees in the hazard but in true Priems style the ball carved obediently to the right, missed every tree and finished pin high just off the green to the left.  Gordon must have left his good glasses at home as he had to ask a few times where the flag was.  Dennis took great delight in telling him every time, that it was on top of the stick.  Slow learner?

Now, there had been some discussion as to whether, since there was such a good roll-up, there should be Championship points awarded for the day.  Everybody was pretty keen on the idea, at least until it became clear which team was in second place.  And that team was Joe, Ryan, Bob and Keith.  And no, they don’t have it in for Joe, Ryan or Keith.  Now, this team was a good example of how not to manage your ball selection.  Despite Ryan driving or almost driving the green on some of the final holes, they were forced to use much less favourable locations to get the tee shot tallies up to scratch.  And when the out-standing (as distinct from outstanding) player played shots into hazards it started to get just a bit hairy towards the end but they still managed 66/57.  This team also caused more than a little trouble for the Club Captain as he read the results and couldn’t work out who Je, Bib and Kath were.  So confused, in fact, that he needed to be reminded to read out the winning team.

Just a fraction behind with the same gross were Simon, Chrispy and Allan.  Now, Simon was bragging about how many birdies he scored on his own on Thursday.  Today he was getting pretty excited about the birdies that he scored as part of a team so just imagine how excited he would get after a solo effort.  As for the rest, there were plenty of birdie chances but the putts would just not fall.  Matt and his team know the agony only too well after their four putts just lipped the hole and refused to fall on the 17th (the 18th was almost as bad, they just missed by more)

Confusion reigned supreme once more on the Nearest the Pin competition front.  Just to be clear.  There is one ProPin that is permanently on the 18th (despite what happened last week).  If the mobile (or 18th) ProPin jackpots, it stays on that hole until it is won.  So, despite the labelling on the box, the BallPin today was on the 12th and the winning shot was played by Chrispy who must have done really well to get inside the mark set by Gordo which was only a couple of metres out.  The big cohuna jackpot ProPin was on the 15th and SOS saved the day for his team by putting his drive to 3.91m.  Because of the confusion about which hole was which, Harry was having a conversation with himself about whether this was the ProPin or the BallPin which just happened to be in the midst of Whitey’s backswing.  The result of the downswing was far from spectacular and the ball did not make it to the red markers and so was technically a draughtie.  SOS agonised over whether to take the shout given the circumstances and being a team event and all but eventually decided that beer trumps team spirit any day.  Harry couldn’t bring himself to accept the offer so graciously made by Whitey.

The ProPin on the 18th was taken out by a shot from Jason, who was another one who had a good day off the tee today.  He placed it at 4.55m and as reported earlier, neither he nor his team-mates could read the break of the green to snare the birdie.

The time for the Annual Challenge weekend in Shepparton is drawing closer and there was quite a bit of discussion after the round.  People have probably been inspired by the tales emanating from the Bellarine weekend.  If you haven’t signed up, you would have to speak nicely to Gordon.  It might be possible to squeeze some more in, but no guarantee.  Another Major coming up in a couple of weeks so this is a big chance to catch up on Bob in the Championship Tables with a double lot of points up for grabs.  And we’ll have three weeks of Stableford in a row.  Bet nobody complains about that!  In the meantime, a Monthly medal and a round of Par to get out of the way first.

Results for Saturday, 24 June 2017
1st Andrew Blight, Gordon Hill, Rob Priems, Dennis Ward(63, 54) 2nd Keith Delzoppo, Bob McDonald, Ryan Porker, Joe Wagenecht(66,57)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin No 1 15th Stephen O’Sullivan and team ProPin No 2 18th Jason Hopkins and team BallPin 12th Chris Priems and team

The gathering around the first tee this morning was reminiscent of a penguin colony down in Antarctica where those fabled birds huddle around in groups and exclaim ‘Cah cah cahrikey it’s cold’  or words to that effect.  There was lots of blowing into clenched fists and the winter gloves and mittens were out.  SOS reckons he nearly lost three fingers with a jarring second shot on the first hole, his fingers were so cold.  But, despite the icy conditions, there was still one (fool)hardy soul out there in shorts.  The other eighteen were more sensibly dressed but there were no takers for Ed’s offer of a nice warm woolly beanie.  Probably, people thought that the pigeons might have been nesting in it.  All in all, a very good turn out considering the number of elites slumming it down the Bellarine although there could have been another attraction with the offer of double jackpot ProPins.

The course was a bit damp despite the lack of any recent rain and preferred lies were in place through the green.  Dale claimed he was merely taking a preferred lie when he sconed his second on the 10th and popped the ball half a metre in the air and moved it half a metre forward and left a hole in the turf that was only a bit less than half a metre (well maybe a couple of centimetres).  Other than that, there were no draughties reported today but there were a couple of close shaves.  And, once again the birdies were pretty thin on the ground considering the number of players in the field.  We could only rack up four between the lot of us and that lack of accuracy could explain the outcome of the par 3 events.

Michael had done his usual rounds of the greens before the start of play and as tee marshall he took the decision that the 18th, with the pin well back on the upper deck, would be too likely to Jackpot again and so, that was set as the BallPin and the two ProPins were nominated for the 12th and the 15th.  So, who do you think won a ball on the 18th?  Michael, of course, but at a reported 7.94m (measured for the inside ProPin) he would not have been in line for the money and his prediction was correct.  The 12th went close to remaining a clean skin but Joe did manage to get his ball within the limit and he collected a tidy little sum for his shot to 2.5m.  And, as for the 15th, you had better believe it, it has done the old Jackpot once again and so there will be a big pot to vie for again next week.  So, Chrispy got half his wish and has a good reason to chance his arm next week.

However, the man of the day was none other than Bobbie – again.  He claims you wouldn’t have collected much in the swear tin this week and coming in at the head of the pack with a +1 scoreline could go some way to explaining that.  At least he wasn’t able to blame the ‘volcanoes’ around the holes today because, in at least one instance, there was a visible depression from the collar around the cutting/extraction tool.  Bob’s lead in both Championship tables has extended even further as a result and the peloton is going to have to increase the pace or the break-away could very well have an easy sprint to the line at the end of the year.

Harry, to quote Keith on the tee at the 8th, was ‘playing like a man possessed’.  Needless to say the next two holes resulted in minus scores.  Thanks, Keith!  Still, a square card at the end of the day was a pretty fair result and it was up to Brendon to prove that it wasn’t a fluke and come in with that score as well.  Gordon managed to come in third place with a score of -1.  He did this despite putting his drive OOB on the 13th.  The second shot with his second ball came up short of the green from where he proceeded to chip it in for his square result.  Michael, who was having a bit of a one on one competition with Gordo had a similarly adventurous time.  From a drive that finished close to the hazard on the left his second went close to OOB.  His chip onto the green hit the pin and stopped less than half a metre from the hole.  What should have been a tap-in putt for the par wasn’t.  Several holes later, Gordon was still reminding Michael about what a crap putt it was on the 13th.  Despite the set-back and the sledging, Michael still managed a -2 and took out 4th place.

There was a quadruplet filling 5th place with a quadruple of minuses with Simon, Brent, Joe and Dennis each collecting a point in their quest for the Club Championship.  Simon wasn’t 100% happy with his performance today because, apparently, somebody slipped two stupid-pills into his plate of Weeties this morning.   But, he had been warned that number 20 was probably last Thursday week.  Dennis has recovered well from his bout of surgery and maybe they fixed his golf-swing as well as his plumbing.  Brent had been playing his driver very evenly, one went right, the next one went left and so on.  He took it out on the 8th and left a scorch mark right in the dead centre of the club, the ball went absolutely straight and cleared the fence around the billabong on the first hop.

Allan really enjoyed at least three holes of golf today, the other fifteen, not so much.  One of those was the 18th, where the prospect a winning a ball prompted him to take out his driver to make sure he got it up (the ball up the hill that is).  The resulting shot would have done proud a 65degree wedge as it flew high in the air and finished not far past the red markers.  Trevor walked the course today, just to see whether he could and plans were in place for a rescue if required.  But, he did make it around so well done Trev.  His score was a bit off the pace so maybe the extra exertion did take its toll.

Bob scored a bogie on the 16th but it was very nearly a par when his chip onto the green hit another ball and deflected to finish mere millimetres from the hole.  Probably down to his years bent over a billiards table practicing his in-off shot.  On the 8th, Targe very carefully lined up his approach shot after removing the GUR marker and generally pfaffing about.  There was one tree root protruding above the ground, the ball hit it and flew across the green as far as the OOB fence.  A ‘Targe special’ putter shot from a lie that nobody else could have played (according to reports) near as dammit hit the pin.  But it didn’t, as did the putt back.  Nearly almost, but not quite.

MattH was with us today and he resulted in heaps of confusion and multiple recounts of the number of cards submitted.  He had to rush off to other commitments and had entrusted somebody to submit his inside comp card to Reception.  But we shouldn’t blame Matt for whoever left it in with our lot.  Bob marked his card – just sayin’.  The other MattN joined us for the second time today and we add another welcome to the Club.  And, while on the topic of welcomes, there was no footie at the Darklands this weekend and so the other DennisT was also out with us.  But he didn’t succeed in replacing his Darklands pay with the booty from the ProPin

Next week is our Solstice Social Day with an Ambrose event.  We will be endeavouring to fill each team with an even distribution of handicaps so it would be good if everybody can make the effort to get to the course a bit earlier to give enough time for the teams to be filled properly and fairly.  A copy of the rules will be emailed to everybody.  Everybody seems to have enjoyed the event last year and, besides, there is a heap of money up for grabs on one of the ProPins.

Results for Saturday, 17 June 2017
1st Bob McDonald(+1) 2nd Harry Boughen(□) 2nd Brendon Mitchell(□) 3rd Gordon Hill(-1) 4th Michael Gourlay(-2) 5th Simon Powell(-4) 5th Brent Rowley(-4) 5th Joe Wagenecht(-4) 5th Dennis Ward(-4)

Seniors Results: 1st Bob McDonald (+1) 2nd Harry Boughen (□) 3rd Gordon Hill (-1)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin No 1 12th Joe Wagenecht ProPin No 2 15th Jackpot BallPin 18th Michael Gourlay